Maybe World Champion Sergio Scarpetta and his challenger will narrow that list down in the 3-Move WCM 2019! If Mr. Alex is the challenger, and I hope he is, nobody will be better prepared for those ballots to be played!

So, no, in fact the critical openings were not underrepresented or shy, but the number of 2 ballots out of 36 is what one would expect in a random selection under the current rules.

Or do you suppose that we need more critical ballots? The only way to do it would be to exclude "uncritical" openings and to reduce the number of 156 openings, like using a "tough deck". But would that still be 3-move checkers?

Ingo, my take on Richard Pask's original post was that there are only ten ballots left that have not been played in a WCM yet. My comment about Mr. Alex was about his considerable skill in general in 3-move restriction checkers. I'm in favor of using all sound 3-move openings for the 3-Move World Championship. The "hard deck" becomes the "easy deck" if you know the ballots are narrowed down in advance. Even the Single Corner opening has tremendous scope, like the Giuoco Piano opening in chess.

Rules are still the same as adopted by our fathers in 1930-s - EVERY SOUND OPENING SHALL BE PLAYED.

This great rule was introduced by people who developed and started 3-moves title in 1934. Asa Long was one of founders.

This rule is neutral to everyone. When we start talking about "critical openings" or "balanced openings" - this is extremely subjective. Some people think one opening is critical, other people thinks different.

Ingo counted 12 critical opening, but for me about 50 openings are very uneven and generate winning chances.

So ... "don"t fix things which are not broken !!"

In Russian checkers they started using "flying man" concept. That's not a bad idea, but today they have 5 or 6 different sets of cards, balanced and unbalanced, where several players try to promote only what they propose.

BTW. From 10 openings which were never played in World Title matches, not all of them are critical. This is just factor of lottery and random pick.

Yes, George and Alex have interpreted my original post correctly: I was not suggesting any change whatsoever, but merely updating a note I made in Complete Checkers. Namely, there are now just 10 ballots which have never been played in a WCM.

Of the 156 sound ballots, the evidence shows that there is plenty of scope to lose (or win!) on both sides of all of them. From my standpoint, they are all critical!